WHOLE ROASTED JERK AUBERGINE

Aubergine is one of those vegetables that is so easy to get wrong. I find that it's best to cook it with patience, so it slowly breaks down and becomes so tender and just melts in your mouth.

This dish is by far my favourite way to make aubergine. just a few ingredients, which gets soaked up by the aubergine as it roasts. The base of the marinade is roasted garlic & jerk, which can be found in most supermarkets in different forms. The type this recipe uses is a wet paste form. Jerk is such an easy way to amp up the flavour in any vegetable dish!

pre-recipe for marinade:

To roast the garlic simple take a head of roasted garlic, rub with a bit of olive oil and place on a baking tray and allow to roast for 20mins in a pre-heated oven at gas mark 6. Take out of the oven, it should be fragrant, store in your fridge when cooled, ready to add to the marinade.

pre-recipe for aubergine:

Take aubergine and a sharp knife - slice just under the stem all the way through the middle so that the aubergine isn't completely separated, then cut another 3/4 slices in each halves of the aubergine depending on how big they are.

Marinade Ingredients:

head of roasted garlic

8 tablespoons of soy sauce

4 teaspoons of jerk (alter this depending on your taste for heat)

2 tablespoon of olive oil

2 tablespoons of chopped fresh thyme

1 tablespoon of molasses

2 whole Aubergine, fan sliced (see pre-recipe instructions above)

Recipe:

Start by pre-heating your oven to gas-mark 6. Then take a pestle and mortar and crush the roasted garlic with the olive oil together to make a paste. Add the rest of the ingredients slowly, combining together to become the marinade. You can also just blend all the ingredients together, but I find that using the pestle and mortar creates a little more texture which holds really well in the folds of the aubergine.

In a bowl take the pre-pared fan sliced aubergine in a bowl and rub the marinade into each slice in the aubergine, making sure not to be too rough to break any of the slices apart on the whole aubergine. Once the marinade is rub into the aubergine, set aside for at least 20mins - this allows the aubergine to really absorb some of the flavour.

In a baking tray that has a little depth, rub the base with a little olive oil, the fan out the aubergine on the baking tray - giving a bit of space in-between each of them. This should leave a bit of the marinade behind - which will be used for basing it.

Cover the aubergine with foil, and then place in the oven for 20mins. After twenty minutes, flip the aubergine around on the other and put back in the oven for another 15mins covered. After the 15mins, take off the foil and base with the remaining marinade. Allow to bake uncovered for a final five minutes!

This will be so soft and packed with flavour in the middle - but lovely and caramelised on both sides. This is best served with some roti - or rice & peas and some of your favourite veg!